From H. W.
Oct. 13. Mr. G., who had just come from the Point, told me a very nice thing about the men there. It seems that a few weeks ago Mr. Tomlinson made an address to them at church about there being five church-members in jail for shooting cattle, and after he got through, ‘Siah, the foreman and elder of the Fripp Point Plantation, rose and indorsed what he had said, adding that the thing had never happened on his place. That very week an ox was shot there, and Mr. G. has been unable to find out who did it, all the men protesting that they did not know. So to-day he called them all up and talked to them, and then spoke of the ox and asked them what they thought they ought to do. One man rose and proposed to pay for it—another seconded the motion, and they passed the resolution to do so by a vote of sixteen against two! Mr. G. was very much pleased, and gave notice that if the perpetrator of the deed would come to him and confess within four days he should be let off without paying the fine.
Oct. 20. Thomas seemed much better, but very weak, and asked me if I would not give him some liquor! I asked if he had ever been in the habit of drinking it, and he said yes, that he bought it by the pint at camp! He belongs to the First South Carolina Volunteers, Colonel Higginson’s Regiment. It is dreadful to think of such means of civilization being introduced among these poor people. It made me heartsick.
While I was dressing for dinner C. came up to ask me if I had “any prejudice against color,” as he had asked the steward of the Wabash146 to dine, “a Boston boy who speaks English as well as you do.” We found him a very bright, intelligent young fellow and very modest and unassuming withal—gave his name only as “Joseph” both to Mr. Soule and C. He had come foraging for the Admiral, and as C. found him waiting for the people to come from the field, he took him about with him and brought up at the house. He was on board the Mohegan when Port Royal was taken and had then just come from the coast of Africa where they had taken Gordon, the slave-pirate, on board the barque Ariel, and he gave us a most interesting account of the whole affair, as he went on board with the Captain when he ordered the hatches to be opened and the nine hundred blacks were discovered. C. says he overheard Amaritta say to him, “You free man? I t’o’t so, when I see you walk wi’ buckra,” and old Grace, when he asked her if she had any eggs, answered, “No, Maus—my dear,” her first impression being that as he walked “wid buckra” she must be respectful, and then remembering that she must not say “Maussa” to a black man. He is black as Robert, but with Saxon features. Speaking of Henry, he asked, “Is he short and stout and about my complexion?” Henry is almost white!
Oct. 22. Limus is full of amazement at the men of the Fifty-Fifth147 and could not express his surprise at their walking up to their post-office kept by a black man, and opening their letters to read “just like white men!” They don’t know what to make of educated blacks,—it upsets all their ideas on the relative position of the two races! I expected some remarks from Rose about our sable guest—she was not here, but the next day she began: “That stranger man eat up here? Which side him eat?” In the dining-room with us. “Him free man?” Yes, he was born in Boston. “Him read and write?” Yes, as well as I can. This made her open her eyes, and when I told her that in Boston there were schools for the black children to go to just like those for the white children, where they could learn the same things, she departed with a very quiet, “Yes, Ma’am.”